


Focal Point

by lightningsmcqueen



Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: First Kiss, Getting Together, M/M, athena and maddie are only mentioned, buck risking his life yet again, eddie being stressed yet again, the entire team is stressed but eddie is Stressed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-17 17:26:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,507
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29844927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lightningsmcqueen/pseuds/lightningsmcqueen
Summary: “Eddie, we all want –”“No! No, because it’s different for me!” And Eddie grits his teeth as he feels tears run down his face. “It’s different for me.” He repeats, but softer and his voice cracks. He’s staring hard at the ground as he leans against the engine.orBuck runs into a burning building and Eddie's life grinds to a halt.
Relationships: Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz
Comments: 16
Kudos: 473





	Focal Point

**Author's Note:**

> thank u very much to my fwiend robin for encouraging me to write this, I would die for her
> 
> title is from "I Found" by Amber Run

Bobby’s hand slaps against Eddie’s back as he hurries them towards the exit. He’s sure Bobby is yelling at him to move faster, hurry, but over the building collapsing behind them, Eddie can’t hear much else besides his own labored breathing. Hen and Chim are ducking their heads, barreling forward in front of him, and he trusts that Buck is following closely behind Bobby. They’re so close to the exit, he can see the flashing lights of trucks and engines from the other stations, and the closer they get, the more the smoke thins, and breathing gets a bit easier. 

Bobby practically pushes him out of the small exit when they reach it, and he slams into Hen’s back, and they both fall through the opening with a shout and then take several deep breaths as they inhale fresh air as much and as quickly as they can. Eddie’s staring up at the sky, mask off, letting himself breathe before remembering he has to get up and move farther away from the building, but as he gets up he sees Bobby arguing with Buck at the threshold of the building. Before he can think he’s on his feet and walking towards them as fast as he can – he knows what Buck’s doing. 

“I heard someone, Bobby!” Buck shouts, his voice is raspy from the bad air and it cracks. “I have to go back!”

“Buck, no! It’s too dangerous! The building is becoming less and less stable the longer we stand here. Come on!” Bobby points towards the line the police have marked off, Chim and Hen stand by it, watching them, trying to decipher what’s going on. 

“Exactly! So I should go now!” Buck counters and Eddie wants to pick him up, throw him over his shoulder, and march back to the safety barrier. 

“Buck do not–” Eddie steps towards him and reaches out, but Buck cuts him off.

“You know I have to do this, I’m sorry.” Buck gives them both a pained look before turning and running back into the haze of smoke and fire.

“Buck!” Eddie hears two other voices yell in unison with him, but he’s the only one Bobby is dragging away. 

Hen and Chim are trying to push past the officers at the barrier, stressing that they need to get to Eddie and Bobby. Eddie distantly hears them arguing, but he’s too busy trying to break free from Bobby’s grip to pay attention to what exactly is being said. He’s yelling and twisting, but Bobby won’t let go of him, and he watches the rectangle Buck ran through getting smaller and smaller. In a last-ditch effort to get out, he stills and feels Bobby’s hands relax for a second, and in that second Eddie throws his full body weight forward and just barely slips through Bobby’s fingers. 

He takes maybe three steps before he stops in his tracks, staring forward in horror.

The building gives a giant moan. Eddie freezes. The front collapses. Time stops. The sound of the flames gets louder. Time begins again. 

In his peripheral, he sees Bobby grind to a halt next to him, he imagines a similar look of horror sits on his face. The only exit now sits in front of them, burning, and smoke billows out of the windows surrounding it. 

Before he can process what’s happening, police officers are pushing him back, shoving at his shoulders causing him to gracelessly stumble backward. His eyes don’t leave the building. Buck is in there. Buck is in there. With no way out. The last thought makes him want to be sick. 

He’s guided to the 118 engine where he meets Chim, Hen, and Bobby gathered around a radio, exchanging worried glances. 

“Buck?” Hen says into the radio. “Buck?” She tries again. 

“Anything?” Eddie bounds up to them, breathless, pushing down the sick feeling in his gut and trying to focus on what he can do at this moment. 

Hen opens her mouth, presumably to say no, but the radio crackle interrupts her. 

“-en? Hen?” Comes Buck’s voice through the tiny speaker. “Hen, I can hear you.” Buck’s voice sounds tired and worse than it did the less than two minutes ago Eddie had seen him. 

Hen briefly rests her forehead against the radio and lets out a small sigh of relief. Bobby and Chim both look up and give short relieved breaths. Eddie stays focused on the radio, watching the red light blink. As long as that light is blinking, Buck is okay. That’s what he keeps telling himself. Red light means he’s alright. It becomes his new mantra that he chants in his head over and over again. 

“Are you okay?” Hen asks, biting her lip with worry after letting the talk button go.

It takes a second, but Buck replies, “I’m okay. I was right, though. Tell Bobby I was right.” And Eddie can practically hear his shit-eating grin, which makes him relax a bit. 

“You can tell me yourself when you get your ass out of the building,” Bobby replies, leaning forward a bit so he can be closer to the radio while Hen holds it. 

“Yeah, yeah,” Buck replies. “Hey Eddie, I found a new best friend,” Buck jokes, but his voice is tighter than it is when he’s usually joking around. Eddie knows this tone, they all do, he’s trying to play it cool for whoever he’s with.

Eddie plays along. “Oh yeah?” He tries to sound light and happy when he says it, but his voice gives out at the end and he knows he’s doing a shit job of covering up his stress.

“Yeah. Her name’s Audrey, and she’s the coolest third grader I’ve ever met.” Eddie imagines Buck gently kneeling with her, letting her use his mask and air. 

Bobby leans back in, so Hen presses down on the talk button again for him. “Hey, Buck,” he begins, “The exit collapsed.” There’s silence for a moment, and they all hold their breath. Then comes the crackle from the other end.

“Yeah.” Buck sighs, his voice closer to the radio and quieter than before. “I heard it.”

“What’s your exit plan?” Bobby responds.

“Uh, right now, I’m trying to get to the other side of the first floor and find a window, and get,” Buck pauses to take a few slow breaths, “Audrey out, and then I’ll follow her.”

Okay. He has a plan. He knows where he needs to go, and a general sense of direction. That’s comforting to know.

“Be safe, Buck,” Chim tells him and his voice is hard, and they all know it’s more of a command than a well-wish. Briefly, Eddie wonders if he’s told Maddie about what Buck did.

“You know me, caution is my middle name.” And that time Buck sounded like himself again. “I’m gonna start moving Audrey and me towards the other side of the building. Radio me if something changes.”

Eddie’s stomach sinks at the thought of not talking to Buck on his radio for several minutes, but instead pushes it down and takes Hen’s radio into his own hands and says, “That goes the same for you.” 

“We’ll be extra careful for you, Eddie.” Buck radios back. He hears Audrey muffled in the background, and then Buck says, “Audrey made me promise her that we won’t get hurt, so now I’m going to be extra safe.” 

Eddie hands the radio back to Hen and they all turn to face the building, the fire spreading despite having hoses from three different stations trained on it. All he has to do is get from one side to the other.

The captain from one of the other stations jogs up to Bobby and asks for his help on something, and Bobby gives him a clap on the shoulder and a head nod before he heads off with the captain. Chim peels away from him and Hen to go call Maddie and update her about what’s going on, and Eddie’s selfishly glad he won’t have to listen to Chim talk Maddie out of coming down here and storming in herself – he can’t handle the added stress. 

“He’ll be okay, Eddie,” Hen says, giving him a soft look. “He’s done shit like this before, he’ll be okay.”

“I’m gonna kick his ass when I see him again,” Eddie says and he bites the inside of his cheeks to keep himself from crying. His eyes are stinging and his vision is blurring, and the last thing he needs right now is a meltdown. 

Hen laughs a bit, and she looks down at the ground and kicks at some loose gravel. “You two are gonna be the death of me.”

They fall into an easy silence for a few moments, and Eddie opens his mouth to say something in response to that – to shrug it off, to point out her poor choice of words – when they hear shouting, and they both run out to stand in front of the trucks and engines to try and get an idea of what’s going on. He hears the creaking again, but before he can register what’s happening, Hen’s radio crackles to life. 

Buck’s voice comes through, “Eddie–!” and just as soon as Eddie was flooded with relief, dread replaces it as Buck is cut off and the line goes silent. 

They both hear a crash and their heads fly up from the radio, and they watch, panicked, as another section of the building collapses right in the direction Buck was heading. A truck turns its water on the newly collapsed part, and people are shouting directions around them. He and Hen both look down at the radio at the same time. 

There’s no red blinking light. 

Eddie feels the color drain from his face. Hen looks up at him, her eyes wide with fear and brows furrowed. Chim runs up to them and before he can say anything, Hen just lifts the radio towards him.

“Maddie’s driving down.” He sounds as if he’s realizing she might be driving to the scene of her brother’s death. “I couldn’t stop her.”

Bobby rounds the corner of a truck and his eyes catching on the radio Hen is limply holding in her hand. “I know you guys are worried about Buck, I’m worried about him too, but we’re still on the job and there’s still people to look after and care for.” He’s using his Captain Voice and Eddie knows his heart is as close to breaking as theirs if just one more thing goes wrong. The three of them look at Bobby, exhausted, but ready to listen. “Hen, Chim, go to the ambulances and help them attend to the people there.” He nods at them and they split off, hustling towards the few ambulances remaining to take care of those with minor scrapes and bruises. “Eddie,” he turns his head to Bobby at the mention of his name, “You need to be here, present, mentally. We aren’t any good to him just standing here, staring at the building, okay?” Eddie mutley nods at him. “Good. I need you with me. We’re going to talk to the other captains about what to do next.” Bobby turns and walks away from Eddie without looking back, and Eddie hurries after him. 

There’s so much noise going on all around him – news choppers, reporters, police yelling at people to stay back, people shouting, the fire, the hoses – but all Eddie can focus on is the clear and heavy absence of Buck. He pulls his radio out of his jacket pocket and clips it to his shoulder, watching for that blinking red light. 

The other captains are gathered around the back of one of the engines, slightly hidden from view of the building, but Eddie adjusts himself so he can still see it. He doesn’t know how long he stands in the circle with Bobby and the others, just staring at the fire, trying to will Buck to stumble out of it, but he rejoins the conversation when Bobby slightly shoves his shoulder with his own. 

“We need more water. More engines, more trucks, just more.” The woman who’s saying this has a patch on her jacket that reads PARKER. “The whole building could come down soon and then we’re really at risk of it spreading.”

“So what do you suggest we do?” Asks a man with the name HARRISON patched onto him.

“Radio other districts for help. We need to douse this thing.” Parker explains and Harrison and Bobby nod in agreement. “Then, we move everyone back and prepare for building collapse.”

Eddie frowns when he sees Harrison agreeing again, and shoots a look at Bobby. “But wait, we still have a man in there, Captain Parker.”

“Diaz is right. There’s a firefighter and a little girl still inside.” Bobby calmly explains and Eddie thanks whatever God there is that Bobby’s there to back him up.

“Any word from him?” Harrison asks after a brief silence.

“Not since the second collapse, but–” 

“Where was he when it collapsed?” Harrison interrupts him.

Eddie falls silent, so Bobby speaks up, “He was in the general area of it.” Eddie catches the other captains shooting each other knowing looks.

“He’s not dead!” Eddie exclaims and they all turn to him. 

“Look at the facts, Diaz. He was near the collapse, you haven’t heard from him in minutes, he was in the area, and he’s probably out of air by now.” Parker tells him matter-of-factly, though her eyes are sad. Her tone softens as she says, “I know this isn’t easy. But we can’t put two lives above everyone else’s.”

Eddie knows she has a point. He knows she’s right. But it’s not just any person, it’s Buck. “We can’t just… we can’t leave him – them – to burn!” And Eddie feels his eyes stinging again. “He’s alive! He has to be.”

Parker turns to Bobby, softness almost gone and commands, “You need to get him in check. This isn’t an easy decision, but it’s what we have to do, and you know it.” She puts her helmet back on, and Harrison follows her lead. “I’m going to make a call to another district. Harrison, I want you to help the police back everyone up.” She gives Bobby one more serious look, and then she’s gone. 

“Eddie, what did I tell you earlier.” Bobby turns to him once they’re alone. 

“Bobby, I know, but it’s Buck,” Eddie says again like if he keeps saying the words, it’ll explain everything.

“Eddie, we all want –” 

“No! No, because it’s different for me!” And Eddie grits his teeth as he feels tears run down his face. “It’s different for me.” He repeats, but softer, and his voice cracks. He’s staring hard at the ground as he leans against the engine.

Bobby pauses before responding. “Eddie, we have to start moving back.” He’s using his Dad Voice on him now and Eddie might laugh if the situation was anything but this. “We don’t have to move fast, we can lag behind. We can stay here as long as we can, but if Buck isn’t… but when the building comes down, we’re at risk.”

“He has to be alive, Bobby.” Eddie knows how he sounds – defeated, worn down, desperate. “Because if he isn’t… if this is the time that…” And he trails off, knowing Bobby understands where he was going with it. 

Bobby doesn’t say anything else, but he leans against the engine with Eddie, watching police move the barricades and moving people back. They’ll have to drag Eddie kicking and screaming from where he’s standing. 

Eventually, Parker makes her way back to them and fixes Eddie with an unimpressed look, and only addresses Bobby while she talks, “You have to move. We’re backing everything up now, and last to move is apparently this engine, a truck, and you two.” 

Eddie opens his mouth to argue with her, ready to lament about how he won’t move unless she can pick him up herself when he sees a shape moving in the smoke and haze. He doesn’t let himself get his hopes up, not yet, it could be someone that was doing a last-minute look at the building to assess it. But then he sees a smaller figure slide off the first figure, and then they’re both running towards the lights as fast as they can, and Eddie’s so relieved he wants to scream. So he does. 

“Buck!” He shouts and Buck takes Audrey’s hand and leads her towards Eddie and Bobby. 

Parker’s head twists around fast and before Eddie can be smug about being right, she’s yelling for someone from the ambulances to come get the girl. Hen and Chim are heard before Eddie can see them, he’s zeroed in on Buck.

His face is covered in ash and there’s a sizable gash across his left cheek and his chin, but he’s smiling and telling Audrey something as he runs over. It finally clicks into place that Buck’s coming towards him, the little girl in tow, and he starts walking towards Buck without a second thought. Bobby’s telling Parker that they’ll move back in a second and agrees to help her move the engine and truck to appease her, and she takes him around the engine.

Hen and Chim are getting closer and yelling out Buck’s name and some phrases a child probably shouldn’t hear, but Eddie gets it. He’d be yelling too if he wasn’t on the verge of sobbing. 

When Hen and Chim get to him, they call him a dumbass before dropping to their knees and asking Audrey if they could pick her up to take her to the ambulances. She nods at them and when they pick her up, Eddie notices that her feet are cut up and she’s wearing a nightgown and feels a pang of sadness. He doesn’t realize he’s stopped walking until he looks at Buck who has also stopped walking and is just staring back at him. He flashes Eddie a smile, scratches the back of his head awkwardly, and that sets Eddie back in motion.

When he’s within arm’s reach of him, Buck throws his hands up and opens his mouth, “Look, Eddie–” But Eddie will never know the end of that sentence.

Because he walks right up to Buck, ignores him trying to talk, and kisses him. He’s gripping the front of Buck’s jacket in his hands and holding on tightly as if he’s worried the fire will pull back in. Buck makes a surprised sound in the back of his throat but quickly wraps his arms around Eddie, pulling him in closer. Buck tastes like the mint gum he was chewing earlier and ash, but Eddie doesn’t care. 

Eddie screws his eyes shut as he presses in closer to Buck, and he can feel his face getting wet again from his tears, but it doesn’t matter because he has Buck. He has Buck in his arms and he’s kissing him. He feels Buck’s hand move up to his face and he smiles into their kiss, Buck’s hands cupping his face, and Eddie never thought he’d enjoy feeling small, but right now it’s the best feeling in the world. 

Unfortunately, there’s still a burning building at risk of collapsing, so they break apart, Eddie wipes at his eyes and pretends he doesn’t see the fond look Buck is giving him. For a moment, it’s just them standing in silence before Bobby comes over and drags them both back to the new barricade. 

“Nothing is ever easy with you two.” He grumbles, but there’s a hint of a smile on his face. He unceremoniously dumps them at the edge of the barricade before he walks off to talk to Athena.

Eddie keeps his eyes staring straight ahead because he can feel Buck smiling at him with his megawatt grin, and he’s trying to play it cool. He glances over at Buck and finds himself grinning back. Playing it cool is overrated anyway. 

“So,” Buck says as Eddie turns to face him. Buck’s jacket lays haphazardly at his feet now, and he’s got his arms crossed in front of his chest, eyes bright and smile wide. “Is that gonna happen every time I do something reckless now?”

Eddie rolls his eyes, dropping his jacket to the ground too. Feeling bold, he says, “It doesn’t just have to happen then, you know.”

Eddie’s eyebrows shoot up as if he hadn’t considered that. “I’d like that.” Is all he says.

“Good. Me too.” Eddie feels his cheeks flush a bit.

“Are you blushing?” Buck exclaims. “I made Eddie Diaz blush?” 

Eddie tries not to smile, trying to look upset. He fails. “Shut up.”

Buck’s expression schools itself one of confidence, and he drops his arms, taking a step towards Eddie. “Make me.”

If Eddie wasn’t red before, he sure as hell is now. Still, he leans in and whispers, “Okay, Buckley.” Before connecting their lips again.

**Author's Note:**

> tysm for reading!! as always kudos/comments/et.c are greatly appreciated <3 my tumblr is hotrod2007 if u would like 2 yell abt the show with me!!! i hope u have a good day!!


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